Just as Easter has a strong relationship to the Spring Equinox, so does Michaelmas to the Autumnal Equinox. The images cast by the positions of the planets this year are striking, giving rich fertilizer for the imagination. Observations by Jonathan Hilton.
As a cosmic imagination, this equinox moment is a significant turning point for both northern and southern hemispheres. It is a worldwide moment of balance and equality of light and darkness. It is also a threshold crossing. In the north, the Sun crosses this threshold to begin the season of darkness and cold. In the south, the season of light and warmth is initiated.
Equinox marks the ‹middle› when the Sun stands on the intersection of two cosmic planes of existence. Two great planes of the encircling round cross each other, meet in two points (spring and autumn equinox points). The one plane is the great plane of our Earth’s equator extended out to the periphery to take on cosmic dimensions and become the celestial equator. This picture alone can assist us in expanding our consciousness of Earth from a mere planetary physical body to a sphere with cosmic proportions, inclusive of the planetary spheres reaching to the zodiac. The second great plane is the plane of the ecliptic, the great road along which the planets and Sun and Earth travel the zodiac. One can imagine these planes as the centric Earth plane expanded to meet the periphery plane working in from the zodiac. The equinox locations are where these two cosmic planes of Earth and zodiac, for one could see the zodiac plane as the greater solar plane, the plane of the peripheral Sun, intersect.
If we now consider the cosmic moment of equinox as a significant transition in the rhythmical relationship between Sun, Earth and cosmos, let us look at what the other members of our cosmos are offering to this equinox time. Due to the precession of the equinoxes, though the equinox occurs at the transition into the ‹sign› of Libra, the Balance, which from a seasonal life perspective is meaningful, the actual starry constellation behind the equinox point are the stars of Virgo, the Virgin, who is a cosmic image of the Divine Sophia, the Cosmic Mother, the bearer of cosmic Wisdom. On the day of equinox, Mercury, which has been looping in front of the Sun in retrograde movement, came to exact conjunction with the Sun, standing between Earth and Sun, just on this equinox point. Venus is also near the Sun, just transitioning from the stars of Leo into the stars Virgo and having been in a conjunction with Mercury on September 26th. In fact, they cannot be seen (Venus barely visible) at dawn or sunset as they are enveloped by the Sun’s aura. These two planets unite with the Sun’s rays streaming down to us from the region of Virgo.
But where in Virgo? This is significant. We must begin to learn the differentiations within each constellation. They do not carry one uniform quality. For example, in Taurus, the region of the heavy ‹body› of the Bull is quite distinct from the region of the tips of the horns of the Bull. So, how is this with Virgo, who not only has quite distinct regions, but who also manifests a diversity of representations from Demeter, to Heavenly Mary, to Isis…all manifestations of Sophia. The imagination I most work with in regards to Virgo is the imagination of the Heavenly Sophia, the Woman in Heaven, described in the Apocalypse, with a crown of stars around her head, the Sun radiating from her middle and the Moon under her feet. She is giving birth to the Child which the dragon seeks to devour. This is certainly an imagination for our times! This is of course an imagination one would work with at length. What does the Sun in her heart mean? What does the Moon under her feet mean? What are the crown of twelve stars around her head? But, for this article, we note that the Sun, Mercury and Venus are in the region of the head of Virgo, particularly in the region of the crown of stars around her head. This brings these planets into this special realm of Virgo, the Wisdom element of cosmic thought, of the crown of twelve stars, of even Astrosophia, Star Wisdom.
This is our equinox configuration, but now we also have a special star gift included to expand this imagination. Jupiter stands on the other side of the Earth, opposite the Sun, Mercury and Venus in the stars of Pisces, the Fishes, near the opposite threshold of the Equinox intersection point, having now ascended a few degrees above the spring point and in retrograde returning towards it. It will loop around this spring point over the next months. So, along this plane of intersection, in the ‹middle›, along the horizontal beam of the great Cross of the Earth, we have these planets. Added to this, Jupiter is at that point in its twelve-year orbit that brings it closest to the Sun in its own perihelion. It will be the closest to the Sun than it has been for 70 years! In heliocentric astrosophy, the Perihelion of Jupiter carries especially the impulse for spiritual freedom.
What can we make of this cosmic statement at equinox?
To achieve this, we must begin the practice of a new astrosophy, meaning, not to ask what the planets are ‹doing› to us, but rather how can we speak to the planets at this moment out of our transforming Christ consciousness. We are just at the beginning of this new relationship, but we can already strive towards it, if only to realize that we must shift our consciousness from receiver to giver spiritually. We should not, like children, expect the stars to tell us what to do, but rather begin to activate the spiritual Christ Sun within so that we can come to a Sophia of Christ and become brothers and sisters to the hierarchies.
One step in this process that can be off assistance is to strive to eliminate the illusion of matter and to recognize that the planets are not ‹out there› in distant space, but rather are within us as cosmic human beings. We spend most of our existence in the cosmic realm of stars before we enter into the confines of spatial consciousness on Earth. Even during our earth life, each night we unite again with our cosmic nature as we expand into the stars. So, we must begin in our day waking life to also remember and work from this higher awareness of who we are. We can begin to act and think and feel out of Jupiter in us, Venus in us, Mercury in us… Christ Sun in us.
With this in mind, then we can consider this configuration. Jupiter is the sphere of manifestation of the Kyriotetes, the Spirits of Wisdom, a living cosmic wisdom. It wants to become in us the new transformed thinking, sometimes called etheric or living thinking, with which we can work in new ways in harmony with the hierarchies and in healing of the Earth. Jupiter also carries the vision of our future humanity to which we are striving. Jupiter stands in Pisces, the stars of our Age, the stars of brotherhood/sisterhood which are in some way the stars of love, our horizontal relation to the Earth and our fellow humans (as compared to the vertical solstice axis more connected with our egoity and our vertical relationship of below to above). Jupiter is below the stars of Pegasus, the Winged Intelligence, the new transformed thinking which stands above this part of Pisces. So, Jupiter is now closest to the Sun and geocentrically opposite Sun, Mercury and Venus in the head of the Virgin, in this equinox threshold point asking humanity to step up to the plate!
Mercury is connected to Micha-el, the guardian of cosmic intelligence and our partner in overcoming the fallen intelligence and transforming it to cosmic intelligence in our earth activity. This inferior conjunction of Mercury with the Sun is the culmination of a longer Mercury gesture which began with the superior conjunction of Mercury in mid-July in the stars of Gemini. One can just think for a moment that Mercury came into superior conjunction with the Sun, beyond the Sun, picking up the forces from Gemini, the constellation of solstice and the question of identity, the I AM, and now hands over what it picked up at superior conjunction to us on Earth at inferior conjunction. What will we do with this cosmic hand off in the equinox/Virgo region! Venus works more from the heart region and in the etheric realm. On a deeper level, it carries the goal of establishing the new Christian mysteries out of the Christic I AM. So, this is a large imagination which one can just try to carry in thought and ask ourselves, how can I participate in this question from the higher realms to humanity. How can I speak to these stars?
Perhaps a concrete way to do this and bring it to earthly experience is to take time now and for the next days, to stand outside at sunset and sunrise facing the equator (which means in the north hemisphere face south and in the south hemisphere face north). Take some time to hold in your mind’s eye this imagination this week. On your left in the east (in the north hemisphere) observe the Sun rising with Mercury and Venus absorbed by its light streaming through with the substance of the Virgo crown of stars and opposite, Jupiter setting in the west streaming through with the substance of Pisces, brothers and sisters with the divine world and our fellow humans. If you rise before dawn you can see Jupiter before it sets. How do we bring these impulses together for healing and transformation?
Then again at sunset, step outside and contemplate the same imagination but now with the Sun setting in the west and, as the sky darkens, see Jupiter rising in the east in the Fishes with Pegasus above. Jupiter will sail above us across the sky visible during the night as the Sun works through the Earth below. In this activity, think this thought: we as humans stand in the middle – we must always consider the ‹middle› – central to giving meaning to this event, for it is through our work out of the true I AM in us that the potential of this configuration can be realized. Only through our spiritual activity on Earth can the future spiritualization of the Earth and the fulfillment of Jupiter’s vision for us be accomplished. We can and must speak to the stars. Michael awaits, beckoning!
Image Light, Darkness and Earth. Graphic design: Sofia Lismont
